#ncga: THE (House) plan
The NC House has released its proposed new district map. My first thought — after comparing it with the current map — is that most people are going to see little, if any, change.
For the record, I still see a hell of a lot of amoebas on this new plan. (I thought we were going for compactness, contiguity, and that kind of thing.)
Of course, we’ve heard all kinds of talk about conservatives being targeted by the GOPe. Let’s see how some of them fared in this new plan:
- HD 3: Michael Speciale currently has part of Beaufort, part of Craven, and all of Pamlico. In the new map, he keeps Beaufort, and Craven, but gives up Pamlico to Beverly Boswell (R-Dare).
- HD6: In the current map, Beverly Boswell has part of Beaufort, and all of Hyde, Dare and Washington counties. In the new map, she has Currituck, Dare, Hyde and Pamlico. (Pretty significant change there.)
- HD14: George Cleveland currently has part of Onslow County, and in the new map he STILL does.
- HD16: Chris Millis currently has Pender and a piece of Onslow. In the new map, he gets Pender and a nice chunk of very Democratic Columbus County.
- HD62: John Blust’s district looks a little more compact than it does in the current map.
- HD65: Bert Jones currently has Caswell County and parts of Rockingham county. His new district emcompasses about 80 percent of JUST Rockingham county.
- HD67: Justin Burr goes from representing Stanly and (a piece of) Montgomery Counties to representing Stanly AND a piece of Cabarrus. (His home county PLUS a more favorable-to-Republicans county.)
- HD76 and 82: Carl Ford and Larry Pittman are double-bunked. *Surrrrrr-prise!*
- HD87: Rookie Destin Hall appears to be OK. He will continue to hold ALL of Caldwell County.
In other news, things look to stay about the same in The Sandhills. Allen McNeill, Jamie Boles,and David Lewis all appear to be holding on to the same territory. Lee County is getting reduced to ONE representative, however. RINO John Sauls and Democrat Robert Reives are double-bunked.
Chris Millis should be fine. The GOP base vote in Columbus is about 50% and it has much less population than Pender.
Mike Speciale has New Bern and southern Craven. Although the Democrat vote is clustered in New Bern, the rest of the district is fine. He may have to work a little harder, but he should be okay. The rest of Craven is put into a new district with all of Beaufort, which should be a solid GOP seat with no incumbent.
Beverly Boswell has gone from a swing district to a safe Republican district but it is more spread out.
Larry Pittman’s part of the district appears to be less populated than Ford’s, but Ford has coasted at election time and :Pittman has had to work for it, so Pittman is the more seasoned campaigner.
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Hmm, Craven-Beaufort. Bill Cook should consider returning to the House.
Trouble is many in Beaufort County like Speciale.
But, you’re right it would be good to have both.
The more I think about it the more I like the idea of Hood Richardson representing a Craven-Beaufort County District.
It looks like David Lewis and Tim Moore have created a new Rowan County district without an incumbent while double bunking Pittman and Ford, in an effort to get rid of Pittman. If this is what it appears to be, then conservatives need to give Moore’s entire leadership team payback by simply not voting for them. They would have declared war on conservatives and conservatives should fight back – in a take no prisoners mode. But first we need to get some inside knowledge to confirm what appears from the map.
You are on the right track. It is intended to get rid of both Carl and me by having us cancel out each other so Linda Johnson’s hand picked rino can take the new seat. Stay tuned.
If they insist on double buking you, Larry, it should be with liberal Obama Republican Linda Johnson, and then you can have a clear liberal vs. conservative shootout in the primary. And may the best man win! Double bunking two conservatives just stinks.
Happy to hear Millis will return to do his heavy lifting in Raleigh.
Why do you think they keep Millis around? He’s not much of a threat because he plays the game just like Lewis and Moore do although he’s better skilled at hiding it from the voters. There is no such thing as an honest politician.
I recall Carolyn Justice once praising Millis. For that reason alone, I tend to believe you.
When David Lewis redistricted Glen Bradley and Bill Cook out ot the House in last minute changes to the map the last time around, what he did to Bradley was scramble Franklin County, Bradley’s base by creating a new black majority district that included parts of it and putting Bradley into that district.
The new map unscrambles Franklin County and it is now whole and paired with southern Nash County. Hopefully, Bradley is fired up and ready to go back to the legislature.
Also, the southern Iredell district is identical to when Robert Brawley last represented it. Hopefully Brawley is ready to go with a primary against very liberal Rep. Fraley in that district.
Conservattives need both of them back.
This information comes from the NC House redistricting map. But the Senate map has yet to be published. Ford will have an opportunity to seek a seat in the newly drawn Senate district that includes Rowan and Stanly. Then the 76th House District controversy will be non-news.
Good call, Fear No Evil. Ita as if you already knew.
The Pittman situation is a bad one. David Lewis drew two Freedom Caucus members into the same district. Does anyone believe that happened by accident? Then the district is drawn to be particularly establishment friendly, and there are rumblings that a strong establishment candidate is waiting in the wings to take advantage of a division among conservatives and would be a serious threat even if one of the conservatives bowed out.
The Rowan Senate seat is hardly a slam dunk. There is a millionaire who has just switched from Democrat to Republican to run in that seat, and such a last minute opportunistic party switch would indicate he not a bona fifde Republican, much less a conservative.
From what I hear this morning from someone who got it directly from a General Assembly source, the House plan was a product of three people – Tim Moore, David Lewis, and the consultant, with Moore being the most important decision maker. The other members of the House Redistricting Committee were not even provided copies of the maps until the general public was. I understand that the Senate process may have been a bit more open.
All problems with these maps should be laid directly at the door of Tim Moore and secondarily David Lewis. Moore’s inner circle is who keeps him in power, and conservative payback should be directed at all of that inner circle. Let’s go get ’em in the primaries. Take no prisoners!
When we are staring down Democrats who are bound and determined to have power grabbing Democrat judges abuse the separation of powers to impose a Democrat map, Republicans should be rallying together instead of pulling out the knives for factional bloodletting as is being done to Pittman and Ford by Moore and Lewis.
When Lewis puts this map up for a committee vote, hopefully, he and Moore will have either rethought this hatchet job or there will be enough votes in committee to do something different.